This week was Yom Kippur. Our ‘day of atonement’, as it is known, though not really what it means. Because that’s the English interpretation, the nearest kind’a deal, but not what its all about. In the Christian sense ‘atonement’ means beating yourself up, flagellating, somehow paying penance for sins. For Jews we only pay for sins ‘wholesale’ and thus avoid anything too onerous. So instead of ‘atoning’ what Yom Kippur really means is the day you plan how much better you’re going to be next year than you were this year. I don’t mean in the financial world, God is not an accountant. He doesn’t want to see cash-flow projections and he struggles with excel. He wants to see your fucking SOUL, and how it will become a lighter, nicer, more decent, more forgiving, less pedantic, more tolerant soul in the months to come, less victim to temptation and less involved with Chelsea football club.

But I didn’t attend synagogue in the usual way. I’m kind’a ‘done’ with all that. God abandoned me. I can pinpoint the date. February 7th 1973. When Spurs lost 5-3 to Derby in the FA Cup at the Lane. Whereas Mel, an ‘adopted’ Spurs fan by marriage, still has that belief. And so when she chooses to attend synagogue, I opt to stand outside in a stab-vest and hi-viz jacket, wired with my walkie-talkie and do ‘security’. All synagogues have security rotas and I’ve done it for years. Taking my chance with the weather rather than the restlessness and irritation that endless prayer guarantees.

So the question is: what can a dozen 50 to 60 to 70 year old men and women, mainly arthritic accountants, lop-sided lawyers, decrepit doctors, broken businessmen, what can they do if a trained Jihadist army arrives at the door, fully armed? Particularly when younger people could in fact run away much more quickly. And the answer to that, and virtually any other related question is ‘call for help’. Phone a friend. And that’s what we’re there for. To see and react, not to fight. Even though fighting would be more fun.

And security extends internationally too. In the interests of which, Australia is building a fleet of nuclear (powered, not armed) submarines to patrol… well, China. They call it other things, but its China everyone’s worried about. Yet its France that’s the issue. Because the subs should be French made and diesel powered, as per a long standing, 60 billion Euro deal they made with the Aussies. But now the order is going to America instead. Which has pleased the French so much that they’ve recalled their ambassadors to the US and Australia. The next step, should France deem this a full-blown conflict, would be for President Macron to immediately surrender. To the Americans, Australians, anyone.

The world awaits with baited breath. Which I’ll admit looks very much like a yawn.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx